Another great way to skitter dries is through a downstream and across approach while employing a leader with a dropper about 36" from the lead fly. I usually use a Henryville on the dropper, and a wet fly on the point. After making the cast, hold the rod high so that the dropper fly bounces on the surface while the point fly creates tension. Many times when a trout misses the dropper fly, you can nab 'em on the point fly if you have enough patience to hold back on the first strike.

Festus wrote:Another great way to skitter dries is through a downstream and across approach while employing a leader with a dropper about 36" from the lead fly. I usually use a Henryville on the dropper, and a wet fly on the point. After making the cast, hold the rod high so that the dropper fly bounces on the surface while the point fly creates tension. Many times when a trout misses the dropper fly, you can nab 'em on the point fly if you have enough patience to hold back on the first strike.

That's cheatin! Sounds like fun, I'm gunna give that a try next chance I get.

Some of the old fly rod bait fishermen who i fished with when i was young would use a strung minnow on the end/tippet and tie in a couple dropper flies a distance up the leader , while the minnow dragged in the current the tiniest twitch of the rod would cause the dropper flies to bounce and flutter around on the surface , at times it looked as if the minnow was chasing the flies , this method was as deadly as anything i've ever seen on our Pa homewaters. Moving the fly and creating the impression of life at one time was considered unethical.

Even when practicing dead drift, one should allow a caddis dry to "skate" a little bit at the end of the drift. Most of us have figured out that this works by accident.

I started out thinking the proper way to fish dry flies was to impart movement on the fly. But I'm self taught, and learned how on farm ponds for bluegills and bass. I continued that wneh i started fly fishing for trout. Then I read I was doing it wrong. silly me.

There is no wrong way as long as you are catching fish. Mix it up if you are not catching any.

One of my secrets that I discovered long ago on the stream, is skating March Brown dries

Interesting. I am aware of, but rarely use the skate/skitter method. I do occasionally give a twitch in some situations, especially with brookies.

But last year during a MB spinner fall on Oil Creek, after dark, the guy I was with was having trouble with a steadily rising fish. It was directly below him. He'd drift it over perfectly many times, no take, but on his pick up for the next cast it kept hitting as the fly came over top (and he'd miss it). I told him to just lift slower, and then drop, repeatedly skating it over top. Sure enough, he was into a good fish in short order.

My MB story came a long time ago when I lived in NE PA. I was fishing "the stretch" on Bowmans, at the Barn Pool. As I arrived, I observed fish rising to March Browns. I rigged up with a MB dry and covered every riser with a dead drift along the entire pool (+/- 150 yards) without a touch. I stood at the head of the pool dumbfounded since I captured a few bugs and my fly was right on. I turned around and cast quartering downstream to a rising fish, and at the end of the drift, the fly began to skate on the surface and a nice brown slammed it. I repeated skating the same fly all the way back down through the same pool I just fished through, and caught 10 or 12 nice fish in water I just got blanked in fishing with a dead drift presentation. Ever since that day, I try a dead-drift presentation first, if that doesn't work, I try skating or skittering my fly, especially for MBs.

One note on this strategy, less is more. Just try to move your fly a fraction of an inch if possible. Also the less line you have on the water the better. If that doesn't work, try skating the fly more agressively. Another tip. try to move the fly just above, and not right over a rising fish. In other words move it just when it enter their sight window. Give it a try.

yea-who wrote:How would I/we keep a hook on a spinner from penetrating the surface ?

Spent spinners are.....spent (dead). Most traditional spinner patterns have spent wings (wings splayed to both sides) and should be fished using a dead-drift presentation.

If you run into active spinners doing egg-laying bombing runs or skittering on the surface to release their eggs, a Catskill-tied dry is a good fly to try to animate since the hackle holds the hook point off the surface, allowing you to move the fly on the surface.

Form my previous post:

Quote:

Afishinado wrote:First of all, it's best to tie on a dry fly that floats high on the water, generally with the hook point not penetrating the surface. Flies that allow the hook point to penetrate the surface throw a wake like a mercury outboard, and should be avoided. Heavily hackled or palmered flies are usually best used for this purpose. Flies the the Elk Hair Caddis, heavily hackled catskill style flies, and Bivisibles work great.

A Brother of the Angle must alwaies be spedWith three black Palmers, & also two red,And all made with Hackles: in a cloudy day,Or in windy weather, angle you may:But morning and evening, if the day be bright,And the chief point of all is to keep out of sight.In the moneth of May, none but the May-flye;For every month one, is a pitiful lye:The black hawthorn flye must be very small,And the sandy hogs haire is sure best of allFor the Mallard wing'd May-flye; and the Peacocks trainWill look like the flesh-flye to kill Trout amaine.The oak flye is good, if it have a brown wing,So is the Grashopper that in July doth sing,With a green body, make him on a midle siz'd hook;But when you have catcht fish, then play the good Cook.Once more my good brother, Ile speak in thy eare,Hogs, red Cows, & Bears wooll, to float best appear,And so doth your fur, if rightly it fall;But alwayes remember, make two and make all.

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Sure, we can assiduously three-quarter our wets down stream, mend, and wait out each fly swing, which to my way of thinking, anyway, relegates to the angler to role of butler, rather than nemesis.

afishinado wrote:Some good methods mentioned above. Skittering your dry fly is one of the ways to get fish to come up to your flies when they are active on the water. Egg laying caddis are notorious for this.

Yes, and this is really fun fishing because of the savage strikes. I've had times during the Grannoms, late in the afternoon, when Grannoms were heavy on the water, laying eggs, when a skittered caddis drew hard strikes and you could put a dead drifted caddis right over them repeatedly and it would be ignored.

Try skittering, twitching etc. for brook trout, too. Not just during a caddis hatch, but any time. Brookies often charge a fly with a bit of movement. Ken Undercoffer pointed this out to me, and it sure works.

On heavy pressured streams, I've watched some fish taking mayfly duns - but only ones that move. It's like they somehow know that they are the real thing. I've seen this happen with many different kinds of duns. And I would have to twitch or skitter the fly to get them to hit.